Southern Pac. Co. v. California Adjustment Co.

(after stating the facts as above). [1] The defendant contends that the constitutional provision as it existed from 1879 until October 10, 1911, is invalid, because in terms it attempts to regulate interstate commerce, and the attempt so to regulate interstate commerce is so intermingled with the other provisions that it cannot be presumed that the section would have been adopted if the invalidity of the first portion thereof had been known, and that therefore the whole section falls. It is true that the first clause of section 21 expressly refers to freight and passengers within the state, or coming from or going to any other state, and as to such freight and passengers it prohibits discrimination in charges or facilities for transportation. Conceding that that clause of the section may be held invalid as applying to interstate commerce, its invalidity cannot be imputed to the second clause, or the long and short haul clause, for that portion of the section does not depend upon or refer to the first clause, and it contains no reference to interstate commerce. No ground is perceived for holding that provision unconstitutional. It was unnecessary to its validity that it should…